When your new playground mate says yes, she’s 12, but she’s “been 12 for a very long time,” you might need to consider the costs of friendship very, very carefully.
But don’t shut out this sad, charming little vampire. As the movie title says, “Let the Right One In.” This obscure Swedish film from last year is one of the best and certainly one of the most astonishing vampire movies ever made. From visual style to story line to its restrained use of shock, “Let the Right One In” creates moods and images that will stick with you for months.
Before you rush out to get the DVD for a 9-year-old’s birthday party, be forewarned this is not “Twilight” or anything remotely like it. “Let the Right One In” is rated R for good reason, though its small amounts of gore are perfectly placed and beautifully modulated to support the art. This is a film to watch and enjoy as a parent, and then to ponder whether your 15-year-olds and older are mature enough to appreciate the rewarding content.
In a snowy, lonely suburb of Stockholm, a 12-year-old boy, Oskar, is bullied mercilessly at school, and ignored at home. Soon that 12-year-old girl, Eli, moves into the apartment next store with an eccentric elderly guardian. Eli’s the kind of girl who can look perfectly innocent and vulnerable with her mouth covered in fresh blood.
Their love is chaste yet electric, quiet yet explosive. Snow keeps falling to dampen any melodrama. Throughout, director Tomas Alfredson frames his ominous shots in Scandinavian linear bliss; if Ikea built a horror-movie set, this is what it would look like.
Through Alfredson’s lens, tunnels and archways signal danger, as do those opaque glass interior doors that separate European kitchens, bathrooms and living rooms. Something terrifying looms behind, and we can’t quite make out what it all means. What you’re not allowed to see in the finale will haunt you indefinitely.
“Let the Right One In” immediately became one of my favorites in the past two years. See it, with or without your teenagers, before Hollywood’s remake sees daylight.
“Let the Right One In”
Rated: R for isolated moments of violence and gore, language (in subtitles), and a brief flash of nudity.
Best suited for: Older teens who love shock and artistic films; all parents who appreciate a beautiful, disturbing movie.
